Suiting Up

You have to be careful when working with a lot of art materials. Many of them have vapors which aren't so good for the body. Using the resin that I do is no exception - and actually one of the more noxious odors - smells a lot like straight ammonia while I'm working with it until it cures. I just mixed up a batch of that to coat a new taping I just finished, and to begin the bottom portion of Ogallala with. I usually put on goggles, wear gloves and a charcoal filtered mask with two straps - not just the flimsy little paper masks that are really just for nuisance dust. Whenever I 'suit up' like that - I am reminded of a time when I worked at this pharmaceutical company years ago. My buddy and I had to make a batch of some really nasty stuff - what made it so dangerous was we were working with a deadly chemical. Basically one fingernail of the stuff could kill - and we were making a 150 Kg batch about 30 to 40 Kg's being this dangerous chemical. We shut the entire building down and just he and I were 'suited up' with scott air packs and one piece over-all suits. It was kind of like '2001 A Space Odyssey' - and trust me, I had a lot of fun with that - walking around the building like an astronaut saying 'Hal, open the pod bay door - Hal' - or I would announce - 'Everyone stay calm, there is nothing to fear'.